08/17/2017

How a person accumulated wealth is a key factor in the decision on eligibility to receive benefits.

Wealthy people are eligible for Social Security, as long as they did not accumulate their wealth through passive means, according to The Motley Fool in "Do Billionaire's Get Social Security?"

If a person worked at least 10 years and paid into Social Security, they are eligible no matter how much money they have.

Whether wealthy people should get Social Security or if the program should be limited only to those without the means to take care of themselves, was a subject of debate at the time the program was founded.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt ultimately decided that the program should not be means-tested, so it would be viewed as a universal right by people. He believed that would make the program much more difficult to cut or eliminate, if future politicians tried to do so.

The legal battles over who is entitled to what from the proceeds of Michael Jackson's music and estate are never-ending. As part of dispute over Jackson’s estate, Jones filed a lawsuit against Sony and MJJ Productions claiming they tricked him out of money that should have been his for producing some of Jackson's albums.

Jones alleges that the companies labeled some money as profit, when it should have been considered royalties to which he was entitled.

After filing that initial claim, he requested to add a claim of elder financial abuse to it, since he was over 64 at the time of the incident. That claim was rejected.

Financial abuse of the elderly is a serious, ongoing problem in the U.S. It is important to understand that every time an elderly person loses money, it is not necessarily elder financial abuse.

To rise to the level of elder abuse, there normally needs to be some sort of intent to take advantage of an elderly person's diminished mental capacity.

An elder law attorney can advise you, if you have any questions on elder financial abuse.

The study tracked 783 people who had signed up for an Alzheimer's prevention program, because they had family who got the disease.

What did the researchers discover?

Those who suffered from a loss of hearing were more likely to become cognitively impaired.

They also found that people who suffered from slight losses in verbal communication skills were more likely to become cognitively impaired. These were people whose language became less sophisticated and specific, and people who took longer to express the same thoughts than they previously did.

They also found that people who began to need hospitalization in emergency situations more frequently, were more likely to become cognitively impaired.

This study could be an important step in discovering how to diagnose Alzheimer's and other forms of dementia, as early as possible.

What this means is that executors, trustees and the lawyers who help them, need to be very careful when dealing with intellectual property rights.

If an estate has a patent, for example, then it needs to be able to determine how much that patent is worth for estate tax purposes and it needs to know if the patent is co-owned with other people who could have a say in how it is used.

The estate must also take affirmative steps to protect the intellectual property rights, when necessary to do so.

Because these assets can be so valuable, it is very important for estates to seek out professional advice on how to handle them.

An estate planning attorney can guide you in creating an estate plan that meets your unique circumstances.

08/09/2017

Medical researchers are interested in why some people become more alert and lucid as they near death.

There are people who do not go quietly into the night and just fade away when they die but become more lucid near the end, according to The New York Times in "The Gentler Symptoms of Dying."

Sometimes people who have not been communicative for a long time, will suddenly appear to be well again. Dementia patients can even have a period of lucidity where they are able to communicate with loved ones like they could before they became ill. This normally occurs within a week of the person passing away and often on the same day.

This phenomenon is known as terminal lucidity and records of it go all the way back to Hippocrates.

Understanding what people go through when they pass away and why some people have terminal lucidity could be helpful for elderly people. This knowledge could possibly be used to give doctors a way to make passing away more comfortable.

Digital technology allows everyone to leave a personal record behind of their own lives.

They can preserve written accounts of what they did and why. Their lives may last far longer than scraps of old paper.

How can people today do this?

They can record videos of themselves and give a firsthand account of their lives and what they think about things.

This can be good for their families for two reasons. First, it lets those who knew the deceased person have something to replay to remember them. Second, future generations can look at it and know how their ancestors lived.

An estate planning attorney can guide you in creating an estate plan that fits your unique circumstances and could well include a digital legacy.

08/08/2017

You may have an idea for setting up your trust, but is it a good idea?

People will sometimes walk into an attorney’s office with plans for setting up a trust, but they get a negative answer which leads to problems between attorney and client. The client should listen, according to the Wills, Trusts & Estates Prof Blog in "Article on Client Dilemma -- Whom Can I Trust?"

Trust law is very complicated.

For trusts to work the language used in the trust documents must be very specific and in accordance with what is legally allowed in the state that will govern the trust agreement. What often happens is that people want to do something with their trusts that the attorney knows is not a good idea for legal reasons.

The attorney is simply trying to save the client future legal problems.

Of course, people can sidestep an attorney today and create their own trusts by editing some downloaded forms. If they do that, they can do what they want with their trusts, but they cannot be certain that what they want to do is legal.

An estate planning attorney can guide you on how to accomplish your goals for a trust and how to do it legally.

Things began to get difficult in the case, when Thicke’s sons filed a motion with the court that suggested their stepmother had threatened them.

They claimed she said she wanted to challenge the prenuptial agreement and that if they fought her, then she would go to the media with some undisclosed gossip.

The widow claims the sons are lying and she has no interest at all in challenging the prenuptial agreement. She says the sons filed their motion merely to embarrass her in the media, and she is asking the judge to dismiss the motion and chastise the sons.

It is difficult to determine who is telling the truth here.

This appears to be yet another example of adult children not getting along with a stepparent.

The question that remains is what is the goal of each side of the conflict?

08/04/2017

Don’t be fooled because married people aren’t the only ones who need to make plans and consider estates.

Single people are generally not concerned with a spouse or children, but they do need to plan for their own retirements and for their own estates, according to Forbes in "5 Financial Planning Strategies For Singles," including:

Single people should start saving for their retirements as soon as they possibly can. Most experts today believe people should save about 15% of their incomes for retirement.

Because single people do not have a spouse's income to rely on in case of emergency, they should set some money aside for one. Six months' worth of income is a rule of thumb for emergency savings.

If anyone is financially dependent on them, then singles should consider getting life insurance. This is especially important, if the dependent is a minor child.

Single people do need estate plans so they can direct who should get their assets after they pass away.

Single people also need to make sure that beneficiaries on any financial accounts, such as retirement accounts, are in place.

An estate planning attorney can advise you on creating an estate plan that meets your unique circumstances.